quotation:
“The last few days have seen a depressing flurry of forum topics and blog posts about the supposed death of Slackware, evidenced (primarily) by the fact that Slackware.com has been down quite a bit recently (indeed, it is down at the time of this writing). For any other modern distribution, downtime on the site might not mean anything other than some routine maintenance or a glitch, but then, Slackware isn’t most modern Linux distribution”.

Beside that the blogpost itself has an addendum releasing the initial tension, i am not that convenienced that adding money in such situations helps that much. If at all.

I think we can all agree that such pledges doesn't make it possible for a developer to work fulltime on it. So the general problem an opensource project has is usually time, which can't be bought with money. Money is used to buy hardware, enable developers to travel to conferences and such stuff. But it also carries the risk that someone has to decide which hardware to buy and which developer to sponsor. Do it wrong and the not sponsored folks will be pissed.

Especially if it is like it sounds here everyone has its own donation button and not a central 'slackware' button.

(Beside that money influences people: In case project A and B need work, i will work on the one which generates more money. If money would be involved, i am sure i would work on some apt-frontend given that it has direct user-exposure and people tend to spent money on they can see compared to the ugly depth-level commandline-freaks-only apt toolset -- even through someone has to work on apt, as otherwise the frontends will sooner or later collapse… So workforce isn't where it should be but where the money is)

It's just like in your hometown football club (presuming your hometown is small enough to not have a professional club):
If they don't have enough players currently to keep up the competition nobody would come up with the idea to start collecting money. Everything you could do with this is buying a new stadium, but you still have no players…
(and please don't get the idea to pay players who played in a game - it will destroy everything…)

_________________MfG. DonKult
"I never make stupid mistakes. Only very, very clever ones." ~ The Doctor

DeepDayze

Post subject: RE: sos save our slackware! Posted: 19.04.2012, 18:50

Joined: 2010-09-11
Posts: 616
Location: USA
Status: Offline

Slackware is where I got started with Linux
Back in 1994 I bought a book that had 2 CD's and one was for Slack. Installed it on my then new 386DX/40 system (with all of 4MB RAM) and was impressed and it was a start of a long ride with Linux

In this instance, it seems that the crash of an old server has hastened the problem of lack of money at Slackware.

Beyond this case, I've been often wondering who belonging at the world of open software can I economically aid. I think that is no fair to receive without to give. We get a very good OS and a lot of excellent programs from the FOSS developers, and some (perhaps a lot) of them have grave troubles with their economy, which is unjust beside the enormous quantity of money obtained for some guy from the world of the privative software, which name you all know.

As user of free software, I'd like to aid some FOSS developers, but whom? The authors of the programs I most use? Then, I'd give my money to Mozilla Foundation, for instance, buy I think (maybe erroneously) they have not money troubles. Perhaps Kernel.org? I believe the same. You, the aptosid team? You (we) have a sponsor covering the more important monetary cost (the costs of the servers). Another team responsible for some obscure but necessary software, like X.org? I don't know, and I'd like to have clearer ideas.

Best regards.

Luis_P

DeepDayze

Post subject: RE: Money in the FOSS country Posted: 20.04.2012, 14:08

Joined: 2010-09-11
Posts: 616
Location: USA
Status: Offline

I'm willing to help out the developers of my favorite apps too

DonKult

Post subject: RE: Money in the FOSS country Posted: 20.04.2012, 19:54

Team Member

Joined: 2010-09-02
Posts: 483

Status: Offline

Most projects have a sponsor. Be it a direct or indirect. A project hosted on github is e.g. sponsored by those even through money doesn't flow (visibly).

Still, very few projects have "too much" money (did you ever had too much money?), so whoever gets the money will properly be happy about it. Personal suggestion: Many projects have additional to their general fond also "subprojects" they collect money for there you can directly see the benefit. Debian for example with DebConf or the new plan to replace hardware regularly (the later will be a huge investment each year; the first is it already).
But money isn't everything. Feel free to send a "thank you" message to the developer fixing a bug you reported. Or do something as "crazy" as doing a whois on the personal domain of a developer and send a postcard to his home address…
Or, if you really want to throw money at it: Just ask if they "need" something. Most people have a wishlist of stuff they would by if they had some money to spare like a book or a film…

_________________MfG. DonKult
"I never make stupid mistakes. Only very, very clever ones." ~ The Doctor